Promises and Pomegranates (Monsters & Muses, #1)

by Sav R. Miller

My dick jerks at her sultry tone, so far removed from the tentative virgin I practically maimed weeks ago. I don’t know what’s changed, if maybe she lied about not being with anyone else, but as I knot my fist in the hair at the base of her neck, forcing her back to bow and present her perky tits, I realize I don’t fucking care. At this particular moment in time, she could tell me she’d made her way through the entire city of Boston, and I’d still have this need to sink inside of her. To make her forget there was ever anyone else before me. Pulling back, I look into her wide eyes, hazy with lust. “Once we do this…” She scrapes my neck with her nails, sending a jolt of white-hot electricity down my spine, right to my balls. “Once we do this?” “I’m not going to be able to stop.” “Who’s asking you to?”

“Marcelline?” I call out, turning my head to look over my shoulder, as if that might give me some sort of insight as to her whereabouts. “Um,” Elena squeaks, shoving my shoulders. “Can you not say another woman’s name while your finger is inside me?” I look down at her, cocking an eyebrow. “Jealous?” Her eyes narrow. “Not at all. Oh, Mateo, that feels so fucking good. Don’t⁠—” Slipping my index finger from her pussy with lightning speed, I tug her head back and stuff it inside her mouth, interrupting her. “I can’t kill him twice, Elena. Sure that’s a road you wanna go down?” The knocking starts again, growing in volume, and she hollows out her cheeks, swirling her tongue over my digit. My cock leaks a bead of precum as the memory of her slurping at my length resurfaces; she smiles around the intrusion, finally releasing me with a pop when she’s finished. “I know you like to keep a clean workspace,” she says. “Tools and everything.” My mouth parts to say something, but the knocking doesn’t cease, the dull pounding grating on my nerves like nails raking over a chalkboard. Flexing my fingers in her hair as that familiar irritation takes root in my gut, growing like a weed to the cognitive part of my brain, I inhale sharply and let her go at the same time.

No one but Jonas and Marcelline know this place belongs to me. Even the phone I had set up for Elena pings her location at the north end of the island, some special feature the guys at Ivers International equipped it with.

Not long ago, I watched him murder my fiancé and then force me into marrying him. Apparently, after the initial shock and anger wears off during times of stress, my brain takes a back seat and lets my vagina do the driving. Or maybe it’s just the effect Kal has on me. Maybe an entire lifetime of obsessing over him when he never even looked at me twice has brought me to this point, and now I’m free to explore it, regardless of how fucked up the situation is.

“Has my slutty little wife been walking around every day, hoping to get fucked?” Not consciously, no. Or at least not with the express intention of Kal finding me sans underwear and taking advantage of the easy access. But with no one else around and my parents’ rules about modesty and purity no longer a factor, ditching the panties just seemed like the next logical course of action. Another nail in the coffin of allowing the Ricci lifestyle to dictate how I live mine. Maybe that’s why I dove headfirst into unknown waters, approaching Kal despite him being covered in blood and the almost feral look in his eyes.

Sure, he threatened the lives of the people I love. Blackmailed me into this union. Yanked me from the only life I’ve known and plopped me down in a foreign place, alone and confused. But he was a skilled lover, and my body is beginning to remember his talent.

“Whoever said Kal Anderson isn’t husband material clearly never felt his hand between their thighs,” I mutter, biting back a moan at the memory. “Is that so?” Even though I’m expecting him, the sudden intrusion of Kal’s deep voice startles me; my arm snaps to my breasts while my hand covers my pussy, acting on autopilot.

“Don’t let me interrupt. You were saying?” “I was just talking to myself.” “Do you hear a lot of gossip about me?” “Not a lot,” I say, heat searing my cheeks. “Just stuff my mom and her sisters sometimes say.” “Ah, yes. Carmen and her big fucking mouth.” The animosity in his tone catches me off guard; I know he and my parents have a relationship that predates his time as a Ricci Inc. employee, but it was always my understanding that he was like family to the two of them. The distant, mysterious extended relative who only came to town when he absolutely had to and made a stink about it every time, but family nonetheless.

“What are you doing?” he asks. I pause, my fingers gripping the bedspread until my knuckles cramp. “This feels like a conversation I shouldn’t be naked for.”

Betraying body syndrome, Mamma once called it. When you’re powerless to carnality, despite your mind knowing better. She’d been trying to comfort me before my wedding to Mateo, saying that as long as he made it good for me, my body would learn to enjoy it. The mind, she mused, was a different battlefield entirely but one she swore could eventually be conquered, citing her own success in the matter. Problem was I already knew what it felt like to want your lover, and there was no chance Mateo would have ever compared. Even now, as I try to brush off my body’s reaction as biology, I know her reasoning isn’t entirely true. My body isn’t betraying me at all; I just wish it were.

“So?” he taunts, raising an eyebrow, forcing my fingers to swirl gently around my clit. My breath catches, and he leans into it, bending so we’re eye level. “What else do you know about me, little one?”

“You’re thirty-two with a Halloween birthday. You like reading poetry and memoirs, though you don’t write at all. You got your medical degree from Tufts and did your residency at Johns Hopkins.”

“That’s why there was blood on my clothes. I know you noticed; saw the flash of distress in those tantalizing eyes of yours, then watched your concern drain when you decided you cared more about getting off than what I do in my spare time.”

“You’ve never cared what people thought of me, have you?” he asks. “Didn’t care about the souls I’ve stolen or the lives ended at my bare hands.”

I don’t care about the lives he’s ended. That’s always been my problem.

“I fear your parents—your mother, in particular—think they can rescue you from me. So in case they’ve planted that little seed in your mind, let me uproot it entirely, once and for all.” My orgasm crests as he picks up his speed, and I furiously rub my clit in an effort to keep up with his pace, the dueling sensations causing my vision to blur. “You’re going nowhere, my little Persephone. I didn’t bring you back to my island just so you could leave, and I’m certainly not relieving you of your sentence. You’ll serve it at my goddamn side as the queen of my little Underworld, and all your family will ever be able to do is watch.” I gasp as he finishes his sentence, the image of my parents watching Kal fuck me deliciously forbidden and intoxicating for some reason. An ultimate act of defiance, I suppose. Arching my back, my release shatters through me, breaking me into a million jagged little pieces. It pulses so thick and fully through me that I choke on it, my sticky hand falling to my side as my clit throbs violently with aftershocks. “You’re divine when you come, little one.”

Part of me should feel bad that I’m ruining the girl’s life before she’s even had a chance to experience it, but the other, darker part of me recalls how mine was stripped away by her parents, and that erases the guilt. I was far younger than she.

“How did I get in? I’m not twenty-one yet.” “You’re with me, and the same rules that apply for the general public haven’t applied to me in years.”

In the days since the flash drive showed up on my porch, we’ve settled into a sort of routine; I’ve been working overtime trying to find the culprit—to no fucking avail—and she spends hers ordering shit with my credit card and trying to figure out how to use it. The first day, it was fishing. She ordered a neon pink pole and matching tackle box and was up and out of bed at four in the morning, prepared to put her research to the test. She was back inside within an hour, huffing about how no one told her fishing was so boring. Another day was stargazing, though she passed out before the best constellations appeared. I only know because I haven’t slept since her arrival, sitting in the living room armchair each night with a bottle of scotch, trying to get up the nerve to join her in bed. But there’s a reason she hasn’t seen me naked yet, same as why I can’t let myself be that vulnerable next to her. The cartography of my body, though lean and sculpted through years of rigorous exercise, is marred with many blemishes. Evidence of my evil deeds tattooed permanently into my skin. All of that has nothing to do with why I haven’t fucked her yet though. There really isn’t a concrete reason behind that fact, just the reality. When I fuck her, I want to do it right, and I don’t want to risk losing a hard-on because I’m too busy thinking about the people coming after us or how my plan is unraveling before I’ve even executed it.

“I don’t eat a lot of seafood,” Elena says, turning the menu over in her hands. She glances up at Gwen. “What would you recommend?” “Nothing solid,” Gwen drones, tapping her pen on the end of her notepad. “Gwen,” I mutter, resting my arm along the back of the booth where Elena sits. “Customer service manners, remember?” She rolls her eyes, shifting her weight to the other foot. “I’m trying to save her from definite food poisoning. Vincent’s manning the kitchen today, and Jonas won’t even eat his cooking.” Glancing at Elena, she widens her brown eyes. “Jonas eats anything. Just not if Vincent’s touched it.” Sighing, I rub the spot between my brows with a knuckle, trying to dispel the ache I get each time I step foot in this establishment. If it didn’t have such a cultlike following on Aplana, there’s no way I’d allow it to continue on in the shape it’s in, but my mother always told me not to break things if they didn’t need fixing.

“I’d like to try the shellfish lasagna. Stick as close to my Italian roots as I can get, you know?” Elena says suddenly, sliding the menu across the table. “And I’d love a Diet Coke.” Gwen studies Elena, raising an eyebrow. She doesn’t touch the menu, then swings her gaze back to me, as if waiting for approval. Elena stiffens, her shoulders brushing my arm. “I don’t need Kallum’s permission to order food.” The waitress’s eyes flash with a dull amusement at the use of my full name. “I’m just not sure you know how bad of a cook Vinny is⁠—” “I’ll be the judge of that.” Elena turns her chin up, scooting toward me in the booth until our thighs touch. Her warmth is like a live wire to my groin, the sweet scent of her shampoo intoxicating.

“You didn’t think my work for your father was my only source of income, did you? How do you think I afford my home? My jet? My solitude?” She frowns. “I guess I thought Papà paid well.” I laugh, but it’s short and hollow. “Rafael doesn’t pay nearly enough.”

Unlike my little wife, who’s staring daggers at Gwen from across the bar. “Careful, little one,” I murmur, bending down to speak against the shell of Elena’s ear. “People might get the impression that you like me.” Elena scoffs, placing her palms on the table. “I’m your wife. I’m supposed to like you. But I just think it’s rude to flirt with married men.” Her comment feels like a stab wound, gliding through bone and muscle in a direct hit to my heart. I rub at the soreness in my chest, nodding to Gwen when she comes back over with a Diet Coke for Elena and a pint for me. She says the food will still be a minute and saunters off to another table, unfazed by the look my wife gives her.

“We aren’t staying for food,” I tell her, opening up the GPS tracker on my phone to ping Violet’s location. “But I ordered lasagna.” “I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: you’re of no use to me dead, Elena. Don’t eat the fucking food.”

Gwen walks back over with a ceramic bowl in hand, setting it down on the table in front of me. Thick steam rolls off the dish, its vomit scent smacking me in the face. Wrinkling my nose, I push it away, taking a sip of my drink. Placing her hand on her hip, Gwen nods at the lasagna. “Aren’t you gonna eat what you ordered?” Her tone gnaws at my nerves, eating away at my resolve. “I don’t know. Are you going to stand there and watch?” “Probably not. I don’t want to bear witness when you puke your guts up.”

Ironic, considering they had no problem tying me to the same fate with another man, though I suppose my relationship with Mateo benefited them in a way mine with Kal doesn’t. Still, they never gave me a real choice. It was their way or face certain death by the hands of the Elders. I should’ve picked death. In the end, I feel like I did anyway.

Kal owns half the island? A heaviness descends on my bones with the realization that I don’t actually know this man at all.

For only the second time I could recall, I’d been given a choice. A shitty choice, but a choice nonetheless: marry Kal or watch him slaughter my loved ones. And after, probably me. I knew he could do it. Even worse, I knew he would. That’s the problem when you associate with men like him. The kind who ooze power, know how to wield it, and know what to do to keep it. The kind who will spit in your face, then offer a handkerchief to wipe it off, so you end up owing him something instead. The kind with very little to lose.

I haven’t had one of those nightmares since I’ve been on the island. Maybe that’s because the nightmare manifested.

Just because he gives you his credit card and a couple of orgasms doesn’t mean he’s interested in more.

No, Elena. This isn’t a Disney movie or some romantic poem. Stupid, stupid girl.

Maybe I am as evil and selfish as my grandfather always says.

I clear my throat, glancing down at her all-black outfit, so ridiculously similar to my own that I almost laugh. Nature versus nurture, I guess.

People come here to escape. Or, in my case, to hide.

Finally, she exhales, mimicking my movement backward, shielding her eyes from the sun with one hand. “Did you…did you really kidnap that girl?” “Keeping tabs on me, sister?” She scrunches up her nose. “You can’t go anywhere back home without hearing about it. She’s a Mafia princess, Kal. What are you even thinking?” Part of me almost laughs again at the condescension seeping from her tone. Like I’m afraid of the fucking Mafia. “I know who she is, and I didn’t kidnap anyone. Elena married me of her own volition. If you want the sordid details of how she pursued me, then I her, I’ll give them to you as soon as you cash one of my fucking checks.”

“I’ve been poor, you know. Most of my life, that was my identity. It sucks, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. Not even on the man who still to this day won’t recognize me as his own.” Violet blinks, reminding me so much of the little girl on the doorstep all those years ago, staring up at me like I was a stranger. Which I suppose I am. Even now. “I’ll tell Jonas you’re no longer interested in working here,” I say, moving back toward the front door of the Flaming Chariot. “See to it you’re off my island by sundown.” And with that, I head back inside.

Because he’s smart. A predator at his very core, alert and cognizant at all times, like a lion lying low in the grass before an attack. I could hide in a bathroom or a storage closet. Maybe try to find a door that locks or mask my scent with the soil from one of the potted plants near the exit. But deep in my heart, I know it’s useless. Kal didn’t take me as his wife for no reason, so there’s no chance in hell he’d ever give me up for anything less.

Maybe if I hadn’t been so openly wanton, he wouldn’t have taken me to that bar, and I wouldn’t have been attacked. Maybe if he hadn’t left you alone, you wouldn’t have been. My phone rings again, that same number popping up. Against my better judgment, I answer, hitting the speaker button with my pinky as the rest of my body starts to feel like it’s taking on water. “Where the fuck are you?” Kal’s voice is cold, hard steel, hurled at me like a lightning bolt. A lazy smile works over my lips. “Wouldn’t you like to know?” “I’m not in the habit of asking questions I don’t want the answer to,” he says darkly. “You know better than that, Elena.” I make a face at the window. “You sound like my dad.” A long, pregnant pause stretches through the line between us, heat scoring my cheeks. “Yeah?” Kal clips. “Then get back here so I can discipline you properly. Put you over my knee, show you how I feel about you running away from me.”

be a problem. I will deal with him.” Tears burn my eyes, and I sniffle as I fight them off, pulling my legs to my chest. Laying my cheek on my knee, I tap the phone, checking the time. “I hate it here.” “Tell me where you’re at, and I’ll come get you.” “No,” I say, shaking my head even though I know he can’t see me. My eyelids droop, obscuring the plexiglass in front of me, and I find it easier to let them rest. “Here. Aplana Island. I’m lonely.”

Maybe Hades was lonely too, and he brought Persephone to his realm because he knew she’d bring the light with her. Somewhere in the distance, a door slams shut, the sound echoing in the rafters. Voices drift in my direction like a storm cloud, rough and angry as they draw closer. Kal curses under his breath. “Elena. Where are you?”